How to Finance a Black Women-owned Business in 2023
Requirements
- Basic familiarity with business terms
- Desire to own and operate a business
Description
Maggie Lena Walker was the first female bank president of any race to charter a bank in 1902. Black women have continued down this path of entrepreneurship. According to one report, "the number of businesses created by black women in the United States alone is up more than 460% over the last 20 years, making them the fastest growing group of entrepreneurs in the nation."
Of course, we've known this for some time, and have the track record to prove it. We launched MinorityFinance in 1998 and noted that 65% of the inquiries from the site came from Black women. While others have come along after our launch, we remain active and at the forefront.
The key issue then, and now, is money: "according to the Diane Project, black female founders are only able to raise an average of $36,000 in venture funding, while start-ups owned mostly by white males have received on average $1.3 million." We provide data-based advice and instruction, based on our years of experience, to help you over this hurdle.
Our class provides information on the current state of Black women businesses. We provide actionable information you can use to get financing for your business.
AGENDA
• Business Planning
• Your business credit history: Dun and Bradstreet.
• Data and Resources for Black women businesses
• The best non profit, local/state/federal resources
• Steps in the business financing process
• Protecting your ideas: intellectual property rights
• What type of financing products and sources/investors/lenders are best for your business: banks, credit unions, factors, hard money lenders, crowdfunding, credit cards, venture capital, digital currency, ICOs.
• Why you should seek out venture capital these days. Which ones to go to. How you should approach them.
For more, see our new book on Amazon: Thriving As a Minority-Owned Business in Corporate America: Building a Pathway to Success for Minority Entrepreneurs 1st ed.
Who this course is for:
- Entrepreneurs
- Women
- African Americans
Instructor
William Michael Cunningham has served as a Capstone student advisor in the Real Estate Program at Georgetown University. A strong advocate for the integration of human values in finance, he involves his students in developing new ways to combine social values and investing. His professional interests focus on environmental, social and governance investing, socially responsible investing and community development investing, and his current projects include writing books on crowdfunding, and writing about the impact of the financial crisis on communities of color. Mr. Cunningham serves as Managing Partner for National Crowdfunding Services, and is owner of Creative Investment Research. He is the author of two books on crowdfunding and received his MBA in Finance and a Masters in Economics from the University of Chicago.